Children’s Sermon

2 Corinthians 5:16-21

New Beginnings

2 Corinthians 5:16-21

New Beginnings

Pictures of a snake shedding its skin are readily available by doing a Google search. (These particular URLs are too long to post here.)

Some of you may not like the idea of snakes, but let’s see if we can learn something from their behavior. Did you know that a snake sheds its skin? Some of you may have actually seen an old skin that a snake has left behind. It is usually all in one piece, in the shape of a snake, and looks dried out.

Snakes shed their skin because they need more room to grow and they may do this once a year or several times a year. It is similar to when you outgrow your clothes and need to get larger ones that fit better.

The snake starts a rip in its skin by rubbing against something rough and then it slips out of its skin in the way you pull off your stockings. Beneath the old skin is a beautiful new skin that will allow the snake to grow.

So what is the lesson? Have you every made a mistake and wished you could have a second chance to do, whatever it was, in a different way? Or perhaps you wished you hadn’t done, whatever it was, at all? Just as in nature, God provides a way for us to get a new start and have room to grow into a thoughtful person.

Listen to this Bible verse: “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new” (5:17).

When we accept God’s love and ask to be forgiven for the mistakes we have made, we are given a new beginning. We leave our old mistakes behind and start fresh. Like the snake in its new skin we have room to grow.